Like Night and Day
by Fictatious
Summary: Post-NiD. NiGHTS wakes up in a hospital and is very amused by toes.
1. Well, we gotta start this somewhere

A low, repetitive beeping punctuated the gentle hum of small motors at work. There were more sounds further off, sounds of movement and voices muffled by walls. The sounds seemed inconsequential to NiGHTS though, as he was so very comfortable and warm it seemed impossible that anything could bother him. He was all wrapped up in soft, heavy darkness and his vague, scattered thoughts lead to no reasons why he should bother to change the situation in any way.

Some time probably passed; he might have known how much if he'd counted the beeps, but he couldn't be bothered. Either way, some amount of time passed and the cocoon of warm oblivion was invaded by the sound of a door opening and shutting, followed by somebody moving around and other sounds that didn't bring to mind any specific sort of action. NiGHTS became aware of his head when it rolled to the side and he began the task of opening his eyes, which seemed sticky and reluctant.

'Are you awake?' a voice asked above him.

NiGHTS managed to get his eyes cracked open well enough to take in a woman wearing loose, light purple cotton and a white wall behind her. He blinked slowly and opened his mouth to answer, but the effort to speak was uncomfortable for some reason, so he just shook his head a little, which also felt somehow strange and unfamiliar. 'Awake' and 'asleep' weren't concepts that applied to a nightmaren.

The woman smiled, looking amused. 'I'll tell the doctor. Do you need anything?'

NiGHTS just continued to look up at her dumbly, confused and feeling more and more odd with each passing moment. He shook his head again and this time it felt even stranger. The thing under his head, a pillow, it seemed, was touching his head unevenly and just felt... strange. His eyes followed the purple woman as she left the room, shutting the door behind her. The door was wooden and the wall around it white, with a picture of flowers hanging to the left of the door. It was a very plain room, NiGHTS noted, rather uncreative, entirely literal without any surreal elements.

Remembering the odd feel of his head on the pillow, NiGHTS started to move, locating his arms and bending them up to bring them above the blankets that seemed to be covering him. When he got his arms free, he paused, staring stupidly at them and trying to figure out who's they were, because they certainly weren't his. They were a light peachy color with some dark blue lines showing just a little bit on the underside of the wrists. The upper-sides were dappled with teeny tiny hairs, they continued out onto the hands and fingers, but even tinier, to the point that they very nearly weren't there at all. The fingers were tipped with slightly flexible, pinkish nails seemed to be were rimmed along the top and bottom with a whitish hue. The arms differed from one and other in the clear plastic tube that appeared to be taped to one wrist and filled with clear fluid. That was pretty surreal, but something that NiGHTS had seen in other dreams before. It was associated with pain and sickness and feelings of dread; in many dreams, the tubes had blooed in them.

NiGHTS didn't find particular interest in the tube, and was more concerned with the fact that somebody else's arms seemed to be attached to him. And also, he recalled, his head had felt strange. He gave up examining the arms and moved the strange hands towards his face, closing his eyes and gingerly landing the fingers on top of them before moving to gently map out a strange and alien topography. It took him a moment to identify the structure between his eyes as a nose.

The door opened again as NiGHTS was exploring a strange pair of ears with a strange set of fingers. A man wearing blue came through it and smiled at him. 'I'm glad to see you're awake. How are you feeling?'

NiGHTS made another attempt to speak and a strange, cracked voice came out, sounding broken and old. '... Strange...?' A feeling that went beyond uncomfortable took over suddenly and NiGHTS found himself coughing, his body convulsing and hurting with each cough.

'Hey, easy,' the doctor said in a calm, soothing voice. 'Have some water.'

NiGHTS bed moved with the sounds of little motors and raised him up as the doctor held out a paper cup to him. Though it did nothing to clear his confusion, the water made him feel infinitely better. He let out a relieved sigh after draining the cup.

'Feel better?' the doctor asked.

'Yeah,' NiGHTS agreed, his voice sounding a little better now.

'That's good.' The doctor smiled and retrieved the empty cup loosely nested in NiGHTS' hands. 'Now, I was wondering if you could tell me what you're name is?'

NiGHTS rubbed one of the strange hands against one of the strange eye-lids and yawned. 'NiGHTS,' he answered without thinking twice.

'Okay, Nights... How about your last name?'

NiGHTS frowned slightly, puzzled. 'Last name?' he asked.

'Your family name.'

He nodded slowly, still puzzled but understanding the question. 'I don't have one.'

The doctor frowned, looking concerned and a bit at a loss. 'Okay. There are a couple of detectives on their way here who are going to help you figure this out. I know this is probably scary for you, but don't worry, they're job is helping girls like you.'

NiGHTS frowned a bit, and could feel the weird tightness above his nose as the eyebrows pulled together. He looked back up at the doctor with a puzzled, curious expression and asked, 'I'm a girl?'


	2. Apparently NiGHTS is 'special'

When Detective Olivia came into the room, the girl had hold of one ankle and was pulling her foot up, apparently to examine her toes. As she wiggled them and giggled to herself. Detective Olivia felt her stomach clench a bit; the girl wasn't acting like the teenager she looked like, the attitude seemed more like a small child as she looked up and smiled brightly at the detectives with particularly bright blue eyes, the kind of color that people bought tinted contacts to get.

'I have cute toes!' she exclaimed delightedly.

Detective Olivia exchanged a glance with her partner. Was the girl mentally disabled or suffering from emotional shock? Detective Olivia stepped over and obligingly took a look at the girl's toes. 'Yeah, they are cute. You'd should wear sandals and show them off.'

The girl laughed and let go of her ankle, crossing her legs and tossing her head a bit to get her long, blond hair out of her face. She grinned up at them. 'I'm NiGHTS! Are you detectives?'

'That's right. I'm Olivia, this is my partner, Elliot.'

'Hi.' Detective Elliot held up a hand and smiled.

'Oh neat!' NiGHTS said leaning forward a little in excitement. 'I have a friend named Elliot!'

'Oh yeah? Tell me about him,' Detective Elliot prompted, giving her an interested look.

'He's neat,' NiGHTS said with a grin. 'He's funny and he likes sports and he's brave and he helped me beat Wizeman.'

'Wow, that sounds great,' Detective Elliot said with a lop-sided smile and a slight raise of the eyebrows. 'And who's Wizeman?'

NiGHTS' face darkened a bit, her eyebrows pulling together and a frown shaping her lips. 'A jerk...' she said in a quieter voice than she'd been using before. 'He's... I used to kinda work for him... Hurting people... I didn't want to though, and I stopped and ran away even though he was really scary...' She stared down at her hands bunched up in the covers.

Detective Olivia glanced over to Detective Elliot again before setting herself down in the chair next to the bed. 'How did you meet Wiseman, Nights?'

NiGHTS fidgeted a little, frowning and trying to decide what she should tell them. She'd never really talked to adults before, and from what she understood, they didn't usually believe the truth and got angry at children for telling it... But NiGHTS wasn't any good at lying and couldn't think of anything else to tell them anyway. 'He made me.'

'He was your father?' Detective Olivia asked with a soft, concerned look on her face.

NiGHTS liked her face, she was pretty and had a funny little nose and pinky-colored hair, darker than Claris's but still very nice. NiGHTS pushed the contemplation of this new adult's face aside for the moment and considered the question, tilting her head slightly to the side and frowning. 'I... guess? I'm not really sure if that's the way to describe it... I was scared of him and I hated him and I loved him... Is that a father?'

'It could be,' Detective Olivia said. 'But I was wondering about how you said that he made you. What did you mean by that? How did he 'make' you?'

NiGHTS wrinkled up her nose as she thought hard. 'I don't really know how it works... He used an Ideya to make us more than a regular nightmare, smart and things...'

'Who's "us"?' Detective Elliot asked.

'Oh, well, for that time, me and Reala,' NiGHTS chewed on her lip. 'But all the second-level nightmares were made with Ideya too, I think...' She looked up between the two detectives for any sign as to whether she was doing well or poorly at answering their questions.

'And what's a nightmare?'

'Things that scare children when they're asleep.' That question was easy to answer at least.

'You made it sound like you were talking about people though, when you said "nightmares." What's a second-level nightmare?' Detective Olivia asked from beside her.

'First and second-level nightmares are people, or, more close to humans I guess,' NiGHTS rocked back a little bit, looking at the ceiling and thinking carefully. It seemed that adults weren't satisfied with simple answers and she hadn't thought this hard about things before. 'The third-levels are kinda stupid and they sometimes disappear and stuff so they're not really... well-defined?'

There was a pause as the detectives seemed to be trying to make sense of that and NiGHTS knew she hadn't explained it right. Then Detective Elliot tilted his head a little and asked, 'Are you a nightmare, NiGHTS?'

'I was...' NiGHTS nodded and then looked down at herself again, frowning faintly in a baffled sort of way and examining her right hand as though it were something completely foreign.

Detective Elliot nodded and then looked at Detective Olivia who gave him a small nod and then turned back to NiGHTS and smiled as she got up out of the chair. 'Thank you, NiGHTS, Elliot and I need to talk to the doctors for a little bit now.'

'Okay...' NiGHTS bit her lip nervously. She had the feeling she had said something wrong, but the detectives hadn't gotten mad at her...

...

'And how did the tox-screen come back?'

'Absolutely clean,' the nurse shook her head. 'They haven't even touched Nyquil.' She turned and walked back to the room she'd been headed for, two doors away.

'It seems pretty developed for a hallucination anyway,' Detective Olivia sighed.

'You think she's putting us on?' Detective Elliot asked.

Detective Olivia shook her head. 'She seems to believe it.'

'So we have her talk to George, see if he can figure her out.'

'And also see if the other kid has the same story,' Detective Olivia agreed, nodding.

The detectives' conversation was cut-short suddenly by a series of shouts followed by a scream. They both jumped towards the door where the nurse had disappeared a minute earlier but the door flung open and she came running out before they got there. 'Call security!' she screamed at another nurse down the hallway.

'What's--' Detective Olivia stared and was interrupted by the door smashing into the wall as it was kicked hard by a bare foot followed by a very frantic teenager wielding an IV-hanger like a weapon.

'ANSWER ME!' the boy shouted furiously at the nurse who was backing away slowly, looking both wary and highly annoyed.

'I told you, you're at the God-damned hospital!' the nurse shouted back.

'That's no answer!' The boy spun around and swung the IV-hanger at Detective Elliot when he noticed the man trying to sneak behind him. 'FILTH!' he screamed and his eyes glanced briefly to the other end of the hall where two particularly large male nurses were hurrying towards him. 'Don't you dare touch me!'

'D-Detective?'

Detective Olivia turned to see NiGHTS standing in her doorway, pressed close to the half-open door with wide, scared eyes.

'Go back inside. Close the door,' Detective Olivia ordered.

'B-but...' NiGHTS was looking past her at the other teenager, the scared look quickly being replaced by the look of someone trying to solve a puzzle or read a sign that was too far away.

'Close the door,' Detective Olivia ordered again and took a step towards NiGHTS.

'... Re... Reala?!' NiGHTS shouted, stepping out fully into the hallway.

The boy turned, his eyes locking onto NiGHTS, eyes of a nearly identical blue, and his expression shifting from confused rage into just plain confusion for a moment before the rage flooded back in like a tidal-wave. 'YOU DID THIS!' he screamed and started to take a step towards her, but as soon as he turned, the two large nurses lunged for him and tackled him down.

The boy screamed with indignant fury and tried to struggle away for only a few short moments before being stuck with a sedative.

A/N: My friend thinks this is the peak of hilarity, but it's just plain practical, really. I needed some detectives and well, I knew where to find some, damn it. I'm not counting this as cross-over, it's just a cameo I'm using to advance the story.


	3. Reala is offended by pants

'Hi, my name is Melody,' the pretty blond woman said with a smile. She was carrying a paper shopping-bag in one hand and an accordion-folder under the opposite arm. 'I'm a social-worker and I've been assigned to your case. You're being placed into temporary foster-care, do you understand what that means?'

NiGHTS tilted her head a little and thought. She might've heard the words 'foster-care' before, but she thought it was a bad place, and she was sure the detectives wouldn't send her anywhere bad. 'No...' she answered. 'Where is it?'

'Well, you're going to be staying with a woman who lives a couple of miles from here. She's going to take care of you until we can figure out your situation a bit better.' Melody smiled encouragingly at her. 'If the detectives can find your real parents, we'll try to get you back to them, but until we can do that, you're going to be staying with a foster-parent.'

'Oh... Okay.' NiGHTS still didn't quite understand, and she knew that the detectives wouldn't be finding any parents for her, but she supposed that she had to go somewhere because apparently she couldn't stay in the hospital.

'And I'm your social-worker, so that means that if you have any trouble or you need anything, you call me, and I'll also check in on you from time to time.' Melody held out the paper shopping-bag to NiGHTS. 'Now I brought you some clothes, so after you get dressed, I can take you to meet your foster-parent.'

'Ooh,' NiGHTS took the bag and looked into it. She could see blue and pink fabrics folded up inside. 'Thank you!'

'You're welcome!' Melody smiled, looking quite pleased and a bit surprised, and then she moved towards the door. 'I'll wait out in the hall while you change. You just come out when you're ready and we'll go.'

'Okay!' NiGHTS nodded, watching Melody leave, and then poured out the contents of the shopping-bag into her lap. There were blue-jeans, a pink shirt, white sneakers with blue and gray patches and stripes, as well as white socks, underpants and brasserie.

NiGHTS understood the underwear fairly well because teenagers often seemed to have nightmares about going to school in nothing but, and the shirt and pants were straight forward enough, but the socks and shoes gave her a bit of pause. She put them on her feet (in the right order after some experimentation) but wasn't sure what to do with the strings sticking out the front.

After some consideration, she gave up and went out to the hall. 'Are you ready?' Melody asked when NiGHTS came out. 'Um, I'm not sure how this goes,' NiGHTS said, lifting up one foot and pointing to the loose strings.

Melody looked a little baffled. 'You don't know how to tie your shoes?' she asked.

NiGHTS set her foot back on the ground and looked at it and its partner. 'I've never had this kind before,' she said with a little shrug.

'Well that's okay,' Melody said with a forced-looking smile. 'I'll show you, here.' She crouched down in front of NiGHTS and tugged the laces on her right shoe tight and then wrapping them into a small bow. She repeated the procedure on the left shoe and NiGHTS watched with interest, trying to memorize the movements and wanting to try it out herself.

'Okay then, let's go!' Melody said, standing back up and giving NiGHTS another bright smile as she gestured down the hallway.

'... Is Reala going there too?' NiGHTS asked in a slightly timid voice as she began to follow Melody down the hall.

'That's the boy who arrived with you?' Melody asked, glancing back at NiGHTS. 'He's being placed at a different foster-home.'

'He'll be all right?'

'Oh yes. Daria has his case and she's lovely.' Melody looked at her again. 'Is he your relative? Your brother or cousin, maybe?'

NiGHTS frowned a little, mulling over the question. 'Maybe,' she agreed and received an odd look from Melody.

...

'Amanda Staine?' Melody asked the woman who opened the door.

'Yes, you're the social-worker?' the woman looked at NiGHTS and smiled warmly. 'And you must be Nights.'

NiGHTS smiled back, liking Amanda immediately. She had curly, brown hair and dark green-brown eyes and she looked nice. 'That's right, I'm NiGHTS! Melody said that I'm going to live with you for a while. Thank you for letting me.' NiGHTS gave her a bow, carefully shifting the bags of clothes Melody had taken her to pick out before coming here.

Amanda's smile got a little wider and a little softer and she stepped back, holding the door open. 'Please come in! Can I get either of you something to drink?'

'Some water would be wonderful,' Melody said, placing her hand on NiGHTS' shoulder and nudging her through the door.

Just inside was a hallway with coats hung on the wall and a stair-case and an open doorway through which NiGHTS could see a tiled floor. 'Let me show you your room, Nights, you can put your things down there,' she said and headed up the stairs, motioning for NiGHTS to follow.

Within the hour, Melody had said goodbye and NiGHTS was left at Amanda's house, her new home, and she was left to explore it while Amanda, her temporary mother, fixed dinner for them.

...

Daria glared at the uncooperative teenager. 'Either you pick out some clothes for yourself or I will, and you won't like what I pick but you'll have to wear it,' she said.

'I don't have to do _anything!_' Reala snapped back. '_You_ are not my master!'

Daria wrinkled her nose at the word 'master,' if his vocabulary was any indicator, this kid might be the worst case she'd picked up in years. Most angry teenaged foster-kids swore like it was going out of style, Reala had yet to use profanity and instead talked with a bizarre arrogance like someone out of a Jane Austin novel.

The rumor was that he had come from some kind of cult, and she was willing to believe that. 'Look, we don't use words like "master" here in the _real_ world, but I'm your social-worker and so that means basically that I'm your boss. I'm trying to help you, but you need to work with me. Just pick out some clothes so we can buy them and get out of here.'

Reala's glare intensified. He crossed his arms. Daria sighed irritably and pushed the cart over to a set of shelves covered in jeans. 'Look. Pants. What color do you want? If you don't tell me, I'll just get these ones.' She held up a pair of plain, khaki cargo-pants.

Reala glared at the pants, looking deeply offended by every aspect of them, and then glared back at the shelves with other pairs folded on them. '_Black_,' he said in a voice that seemed to imply _I am so not cooperating, I swear!_

'Black it is!' Daria refolded the khakis and set them aside. 'Do you want baggy pants or fitted ones?'

Reala raised an eyebrow at her and Daria sighed again. 'Fine! I'll decide! You're getting these ones because they're cheapest!' she announced, grabbing three pairs of straight-legged jeans off the table. 'Now we'll get you some shirts! You want more _black?_' she asked, mirroring his disdainful expression.

...

It was an odd thing, suddenly finding herself deposited at the Dream Gate with no memory of coming or even intending to come. Suddenly NiGHTS was just there and faintly surprised to find it so. She blinked slowly and then looked down at herself, feeling slightly relieved to find her familiar purple legs and white sleeves. She lifted off her feet and glided into the plaza a few inches above the ground, relishing the feeling like she couldn't remember doing for quite some time. It was difficult to realize just how wonderful flying was until one was forced to endure walking all day.

'_NiGHTS!_'

She turned around, and grinned as she saw Owl flapping towards her. 'Hi Owl!' she greeted, waving a hand cheerfully.

'What happened? You didn't return and I feared that you had ceased to exist!' Owl came in front of her and then paused and slowly circled around, examining NiGHTS from every angle. 'Something is different about you though...' he murmured.

'Guess what guess what!' NiGHTS sang, pushing her arms up over her head and twisting her fingers together. 'I've been to the other world!'

Owl stared at her, looking disbelieving. 'Good heavens, what are you talking about?'

'I woke up in a hospital -I _woke up_ for real- and I had a human body and I was a girl and there were doctors and detectives and a social-worker and I have a foster-mother and clothes and I'm going to go to school tomorrow!' she crowed.

'Oh my,' Owl said quietly. 'Oh my. This is quite unexpected! How unusual!'

'I know, right!' NiGHTS spread out her hands and spun in the air a bit. 'How do humans _do_ so much walking!'

'NiGHTS, we must consider this matter carefully to understand what has happened to you,' Owl said, rubbing his chin. 'If indeed you have somehow become human, than it is reasonable to suppose that your human body is sleeping at this moment and that you have crossed back over into the Night Dimension as a Dreamer.'

'Hmm...' NiGHTS held out her hand and examined it as well as the sleeve and cuff not quite attached to it. 'I still look like a nightmaren though,' she concluded.

'That is because a Dreamer looks very much as they feel they ought to look,' Owl replied with a little shake of his head. 'Remember that Dreamers are the very source of the Night Dimension and that it is shaped as they see it. If you are, in fact, dreaming right now, then theoretically you have much more influence over your surroundings than you ever did as a nightmaren.'

NiGHTS thought about that, and the incredible rush of power that had always come when dualizing with a dreamer, the power to reshape reality. 'Most dreamers can't, though,' she mused. 'I always had to help them.'

'That is a matter of their lucidity and ability to understand the power which they possess in our world,' Owl explained. 'Power without the knowledge of how to use it is useless.' He circled around NiGHTS again, staring hard. 'You do not seem to have any Ideya, though...'

That fact did seem somewhat perturbing, but NiGHTS shrugged it away quickly. 'I never needed any before,' she said.

...

'_Puffy!_' Reala shouted, spotting the titanic nightmaren as he raced down the hall, a trail of golden sparks in his wake.

'Reala!' Puffy exclaimed as she turned. 'Where have you _been?_ We've been looking for you, we thought NiGHTS had destroyed you too!'

The use of the word 'too' made a chill run down Reala's spine. 'Master Wizeman?' he asked, feeling dread creep slowly through his body.

Puffy closed her eyes and shook her head. '... He's gone...' she whispered. 'There's just... pieces...' Her eyes snapped back up to Reala's a moment later, and she looked desperate, pleading, accusing. 'But where have you _been?_' she demanded.

'Awake,' Reala answered darkly. 'Help me find the others. We need to make plans.'

'Plans?' Puffy asked, looking doubtful. 'What plans? What are we going to _do_ now?'

Reala had started to turn away, about to set off down the hall to find the other high-level nightmaren, he glanced back at Puffy and pursed his lips for a moment before responding. 'We'll continue just as before. Master Wizeman would never forgive us if we abandoned his goal.'


	4. NiGHTS asks what 'pimp' means

Hillcrest High's cafeteria was too small to actually house the entire student body and so a large portion of students were to be found clogging hallways or populating the lawns and basketball court during the lunch break. The walk between the cafeteria and the basketball court was just long enough to gulp down a burger or pizza-slice and be ready to play when you got there, after wiping greasy fingers off on pant-legs. Eliot arrived eight minutes into the forty-minute break and shot hoops while waiting for the other usuals to make their way to the court.

Once Sam, Trevor, Maria and Daniel were all there, they started up the usual game of horse and Eliot had just scored 'O' when he heard someone calling his name. He looked across the court to see a pretty blond girl hurrying towards them from the Northeast doors.

He didn't think he'd ever seen her before, and it seemed unlikely that he wouldn't have noticed her because she was definitely distinctive. You didn't see too many high schoolers wearing so much pink and purple, or with their hair styled up in little-girl pigtails. He smiled softly to himself, the flamboyant mix of colors reminding him of NiGHTS, and stepped to the side of the game a bit to meet the girl.

'Eliot!' the girl yelled again, a bright, excited smile painted across her face as she trotted towards him. Eliot started to open his mouth, to ask what the strange girl needed, when he realized with a start that she was about to throw herself at him. The blond crashed into him and threw her arms around his shoulders, hugging him tightly as Eliot just stood there, startled and completely at a loss for what to say.

'Oh my gosh, Eliot! Am I ever glad to see you!' the girl exclaimed and then pulled back a bit, smiling at him. 'Amanda said that I was going to be going to Hillcrest and I remembered that you said that you went to Hillcrest and I was so excited!'

Eliot stared at the girl for a minute, utterly baffled as she spoke, but her facial expressions, her manner, her eyes were all very familiar... '_NiGHTS?!_' he gaped.

'Oh! Sorry, I should have said that first thing, huh?' NiGHTS giggled. 'You probably thought I was some kind of freak!'

'Bu-_what?_' Eliot asked stupidly, feeling absolutely flabbergasted. He opened his hands in a confused gesture, waving vaguely at NiGHTS' entire body, from the lavender My Little Pony T-shirt and pink mini-skirt to the striped socks and party-beads. '_How?!_'

'I-I'm not really sure,' NiGHTS said, looking a bit embarrassed. 'Owl says he thinks I got too "real," but that's really weird, I don't know.'

'You...' Eliot stared, shaking his head slowly, not quite believing. 'You're a _girl!_' he finished, feeling quite foolish a moment after the words left him.

NiGHTS giggled and bounced on her toes. 'Isn't it cool?' she bubbled.

'Eliot!' Maria called from behind him. 'You're up! Who's your friend?' There was a slight jeer in hr tone.

'Oh, um,' Eliot looked back and forth between his friends waiting next to the basket and NiGHTS. 'Um, just a sec,' he said, holding up a finger to NiGHTS. He turned back to his waiting friends, 'Sorry guys, but I'm gonna duck out. I really need to talk to, uh, her.' He nodded back towards NiGHTS.

'Hey, what happened to your Lakewood girl?' Daniel asked with a raised eyebrow and a mischievous grin. 'She's not over already is she?'

'Wha- no! Shut up! This- I'll talk to you later!'

Trevor laughed, calling, '_Yeah_ Eliot! You're the pimp now!' Sam whistled and Maria made a cat-call.

'What's a pimp?' NiGHTS asked, looking curiously over her shoulder as Eliot pulled her away from the court.

'Nothing, they're just trying to screw with me,' Eliot grunted, heading for a line of benches next to the building. 'Now what _happened?_'

'I'm not sure,' NiGHTS said with a shrug, settling herself on the bench. 'I just woke up in a hospital yesterday and then the detectives came and asked me questions and then Melody, that's my social-worker, she took me to Amanda's house and said that I'm going to stay there for now and go to school and things!'

'Yesterday?' Eliot frowned. 'We defeated Wizeman last week... Were things, um, _normal_ or something after that?'

NiGHTS shook her head. 'That's the last thing I remember. The Nurse said I was in a coma for six days.'

'Wow...' Eliot rested his elbows on his knees and stared at the asphalt, trying to take it all in. He'd only met Claris, in the real-world, on Saturday. That the whole thing had been real was still hard to believe, but that a person who only existed inside of dreams could suddenly become a real live human being... that was beyond surreal. 'Wow,' he said again.

'But this is really neat!' NiGHTS said, giggling and kicking her feet. 'This world's so crazy and exciting!'

Eliot smirked a little, he supposed that if floating windmills and oceans in the sky were normal for NiGHTS, then normal things _would_ seem pretty crazy to her. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and flipped it open, clicking through a few screens. 'I'm going to text Claris,' he said. 'What are you doing after school? Do you think we could meet her?'

'You found her? That's great!' NiGHTS exclaimed. 'Amanda said she'll be home about five-thirty, so it'll probably be all right.'

...

In the Lakewood High cafeteria, Roger and his friends were laughing at Trisha Tate, who was red-faced and staring down at her school-lunch instead of eating it, which wasn't a bad idea because she could stand to loose a few pounds. Ian mooed at her and they all laughed again. The pink-haired choir-chick came over and set her tray down next to Trisha's, before turning and glaring at them.

'Hey Roger, shouldn't you be working on your game? I hear you got thrashed on Saturday,' she spat.

Roger stopped laughing and put down his dixie-cup of diced peaches. 'Why don't you go--' he started before suddenly he felt someone grab a handful of his hair and his face was being slammed forward into his pizza. The impact was so hard that he had to wonder if his nose was still intact as he was wrenched back again, his face and scalp screaming with pain.

'What the hell are you doing?!' Ian demanded, jumping up on his left and making a grab for someone standing behind them, but he got shoved back onto the table and then a face appeared next to Roger's, glaring in a way that made his blood run cold.

'Listen, _worm,_ you may be a worthless sack of puss, but you're the only contact I have in this world and you are going to help me get back where I _belong_.'

Roger stared back, jaw slack in shock, and took in the pale, glaring face, bright blue eyes and _black_-black hair. Something in the glare, and in the weird way he talked, made something click in Roger's mind and he blanched. '_Reala?!_'

His face was slammed forward into the tray again and Ian and Scott both jumped forward to grab Reala. 'No!' Roger gasped, holding up his hands at them. 'No! I'm okay!' Oh God, if those two attacked _Reala_... 'I'm okay!' he stumbled to his feet after Reala let his hair go, and turned to look at him.

He was a guy, just a person, and Roger couldn't pinpoint just what it was that made him so sure he was looking at the scary-as-hell clown from his dreams, but there was _something_ in the eyes. He glanced back down at the table, locating a small stack of napkins and grabbing them up to wipe the pizza-grease off his face.

'Roger, man, are you--' Scott started.

'I'm okay, just, stay here, I- I'll be back in a minute,' Roger said in a rush and then looked back at Reala. The nightmare-clown-guy grabbed his arm and pulled him out of the lunchroom and into a side-hall. '... How the hell are you even here? I thought you couldn't--'

'Shut up!' Reala threw him against the wall and glared. 'I don't have time for your stupid questions!'

'W-well what do you want me to do?' Roger asked, cowering slightly.

Reala glared at him and Roger had the distinct impression that he hadn't quite thought that far. 'How do I get out of here?' he finally demanded.

'What, the school?' Roger hazarded. 'Because I _don't know_ how the hell you get out of the real-world or whatever.'

'This _school_,' Reala sneered.

Roger shook his head a little. 'Campus is closed, the security guards won't let you leave in the middle of the day,' he said, shifting uncomfortably. 'We only have two classes left today. If you want to skip, it's easier to just not show up and take the whole day out...'

Reala just glared at him some more. 'I don't know, man!' Roger said helplessly. 'What do you want from me?!'

They were interrupted by the door at the end of the hall, which lead out to the dumpsters and was supposed to be locked but had apparently been wedged open with a pop-can, opening and two goth-chicks walking in and pausing. The fat one raised an eyebrow at them. 'What?' she demanded.

Reala glared at her for a moment. 'What's on your face?' he asked in an acidic voice.

'Bite me,' the goth sneered, making Reala's eyes narrow.

'Nonono, she's kidding!' Roger jumped forward, grabbing Reala's arm, which unfortunately brought the glare back on him. 'It's make-up. She's a goth,' he explained. 'She wears crappy makeup so people won't notice how fat she is.'

'Screw you,' she snapped at Roger, but she gave Reala a faintly curious look. 'I haven't seen you before,' she said. 'Why are you hanging around with this pissant?'

'Get lost, Gothy,' Roger waved at her.

'_Shut up_,' Reala and the goth said in unison and then Reala looked over at her again with a raised eyebrow.

Roger snapped his mouth shut and watched Reala walk over to the fat goth, who held her ground, staring back at him with all her delusional grandeur. He reached a finger towards her face, apparently still curious about the make-up, and she slapped his hand away. He glared.

'What?' she asked, raising her eyebrow again and then pointed to her glossy black lips. '... Want some?' she asked, tilting her head to the side and reaching into a pocket.

Reala stared at the tube of black lipstick she produced. Roger held his breath and wondered if now would be a good time to escape. Would he pay for it the minute his head hit the pillow tonight? But if Reala was here, that must mean he wasn't a nightmare anymore... Unless he was possessing some random guy's body or something!

Fat-goth-chick's lips turned up into an amused smile less-fat-goth-chick giggled next to her. 'Like this,' fat-goth-chick said, opening her mouth slightly and making an O-shape. Reala frowned for a moment, looking suspiciously at the lipstick as she uncapped it, and then slowly opened his mouth, mimicking the shape.

Roger fought the urge to laugh out-loud at the sight of fat-goth-chick putting lipstick on Reala. True, he had black 'makeup' or whatever when he was a nightmare, but this just looked ridiculous. 'Now press like this,' fat-goth-chick said, pressing her lips together and then emphasizing with a popping-sound.

Less-fat-goth-chick pulled out a mirror and handed it to Reala, who took it and looked into it with a slightly curious expression. It became much more difficult not to laugh when Roger noticed that with the long black hair and now wearing lipstick, Reala was now very much a goth-fag. He also, Roger now realized, was wearing nothing but black and red. He lacked any pretentious, spiked jewelry, but his attitude so matched the fat-goth-chick's...

But Reala could actually maybe hurt him, unlike fat-goth-chick, Roger reminded himself. A goth that was actually as threatening as they pretended to be? That was kind of scary.

Roger hesitated for a moment and then announced, 'Well, looks like you've made some friends. I'll just go finish my lunch now, because I guess I'm totally useless to you.'

Reala cast him another glare, but said nothing, as Roger slipped past and back into the lunchroom. He almost slammed into the choir-chick from before, who had been standing right inside the door, _watching them_ or something.

'Th-that--' she said, glancing back through the window on the lunchroom door and then down at an open cell-phone in her hand. 'That's not really _Reala_, is it?'

Roger blinked, slightly surprised, and looked back at the pink-haired girl. Apparently scary-nightmare-clown got around a bit? No, wait, she was Edwards' bitch, wasn't she? 'Either the world is screwed or sleeping just got a lot more pleasant,' Roger replied in a casual tone and shrugged.

...

...

A/N: Hey now, I will have no bitching about 'Mneh! Archie-comics! But I'm a snob!' NiD canon is sparse enough that I'm not inclined to dismiss any of it. You've probably noted that I threw Owl in despite this taking place mostly in NiD universe, *shrug* I stand by this inconsistency because while I'll use some of the comics' canon, those mascot-nightopians are damn annoying.

*sigh* On the one hand, I find writing Roger kind of funny because he's all freaked out and confused, on the other hand, it's writing the kind of person that pisses me off the most... It's also a little difficult because I'm trying to write teenagers, but I'm trying to keep this inside of a pg13 rating and so I'm censoring the vocabulary somewhat and it feels a little bit awkward to me... Like a 16-year-old jerk like Roger is going to use the word 'screwed' talking to another teenager? (Maybe if his mother was in the room he'd tone it down to that level, but in the hallway, I don't think so...) 'Goth-fag' gave me a big hang-up, because I hate hate hate the casual use of that word (generally by people who don't understand the etymology) but I had to resign myself that that is the word that Roger would think. So then I just wanted to go find this imaginary person and punch him in the face for making me write that.


End file.
